The Book of Strange New Things by Michel Faber
Published 2014 · 160,875 words · about 11 hours at an average pace
How hard is The Book of Strange New Things to read?
The Book of Strange New Things scores 54 out of 100 for difficulty on ReadingRate, making it quite demanding. The score is a weighted composite of nine measures: four of how hard the prose is to parse, five of how hard the meaning is to extract.
- Vocabulary: 48 out of 100
- Plain vocabulary with invented alien terms.
- Sentence structure: 50 out of 100
- Clear, patient sentences.
- Abstraction: 58 out of 100
- Faith and distance handled abstractly.
- Information density: 58 out of 100
- Considerable world-building.
- Narrative indirection: 48 out of 100
- A close third person plus messages from a collapsing Earth.
- Symbolic density: 62 out of 100
- The Oasans and the scripture carry the theme.
- Ironic distance: 45 out of 100
- Distance between Peter's mission and his marriage.
- Resolution withholding: 68 out of 100
- Almost nothing is explained.
- Structural complexity: 48 out of 100
- Narrative interleaved with messages.
How The Book of Strange New Things is regarded
The Book of Strange New Things holds a literary regard score of 42 out of 100, weighing its place in the canon, its critical reception, its influence on other writers, and the standing of its author. Regard is measured separately from difficulty: a demanding book is not necessarily an admired one.